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This keynote paper examined how the Cato Street Conspiracy linked with rebellions in West Riding, Glasgow and Stirling in 1820. Using new archival material from Kew National Archives I argued that each had to some extent been infiltrated by a government spy system.

ABSTRACTAccusations of conspiracy are nothing new in American politics, but examples in which the government—usually cast as a key player in conspiracy theories—goes on record to corroborate that a conspiracy occurred are rare. I leveraged an experiment that randomly exposes both college-student and general-public subject pools to information about the 1979 House Select Committee on Assassination report of a probable conspiracy in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. I find that those exposed to government corroboration of a conspiracy (1) are more prone to anger in response to the government report; (2) engage in an increased search of available media information about the assassination; and (3) are more likely to agree with the conclusion of a conspiracy in Kennedy's murder. Implications for additional research about government pronouncements on controversial issues and follow-on public reaction also are discussed.

Jesse Ventura takes a systematic look at the gap between what the American government knows and what it reveals to the American people. According to this former Navy SEAL, former pro wrestler, and former Minnesota governor, the media is complicit in these acts of deception. For too long, the mainstream press has refused to consider alternate possibilities and to ask the tough questions. In Ventura's eyes, the murder of Abraham Lincoln and the assassinations of the Kennedys and Martin Luther King, all need to be re-examined. Was the CIA involved in Watergate? Did the Republican Party set out to steal two elections on behalf of George W. Bush? Has all the evidence been presented about the 9/11 attacks? And finally, is the collapse of today's financial order and the bailout plan by the Federal Reserve the widest-reaching conspiracy ever perpetrated?--From publisher description

Abstract
Discourses of Islamist terrorism deployed as part of the War on Terror have fed into a host of conspiracy theories imagining Islam as a system of total government. But even before 9/11, mainstream political discourses reflected similar suspicions. Beginning in the 1980s, concerns about the political establishment were expressed from within government itself in the idea of a government that governs "too much." In this article, I suggest that the proliferation of Islamist conspiracies after 9/11 reflects this mode of government. To develop this argument, I begin by linking discourses about terrorism produced as part of the War on Terror to conspiracy theories linking terror and Islam to notions of total power in the state. I then suggest that Islamist conspiracies draw on the epistemologies of uncertainty produced by the state in order to transform what is unknown or "risky" into un/certain objects of knowledge and truth. This transformation takes place through their location in the space of the sacred-in the soul of Islam. I illustrate these parallels through a comparative analysis of official policies and discourses of terrorism and conspiracy culture, with a focus on the Center for Security Policy website and Glenn Beck's It Is About Islam: Exposing the Truth About ISIS, Al Qaeda, Iran and the Caliphate, where discourse about terror is used to signify the (hidden) truth of Islam.

The Bork Confirmation Spectacle-One Rejected -- The Thomas Confirmation Spectacle-One Accepted -- Iran-Contra -- Nicaraguan Insurgents, a Mideast War, Missiles for Money and Hostages, Dark Ops, Presidential Felonies, and More! -- The Clinton Impeachment -- Castro, Specter, and Some JFK -- Arafat and Specter-the Clinton Impeachment Explosion and the Fallout -- The Stimulus Vote -- A Change of Parties-Specter Becomes a Democrat -- Specter Takes on the Magistrates and Becomes an LGBTQ Crusader -- A Change of Insanity in Washington -- A Former Career Prosecutor Goes After Career Criminals -- Specter's Quest for Federal Funding for Stem Cells Fighting Windmills.

"This book focuses on the constant tension between democracy and conspiratorial behavior in the new global order. It addresses the prevalence of conspiracy theories in the phenomenon of Donald Trump and Trumpism, and the paranoid style of American politics that existed long before, first identified with Richard Hofstadter. Hellinger looks critically at both those who hold conspiracy theory beliefs and those who rush to dismiss them. Hellinger argues that we need to acknowledge that the exercise of power by elites is very often conspiratorial and invites both realistic and outlandish conspiracy theories. How we parse the realistic from the outlandish demands more attention than typically accorded in academia and journalism. Tensions between global hegemony and democratic legitimacy become visible in populist theories of conspiracy, both on the left and the right. He argues that we do not live in an age in which conspiracy theories are more profligate, but that we do live in an age in whcih they offer a more profound challenge to the constituted state than ever before"--Publisher's description.

This article examines the emergence of conspiracy theories linking COVID-19 with 5G, with a focus on Australia, the United States and United Kingdom. The article is in two parts. The first details long-standing concerns around mobile technologies and infrastructures before showing how they translate to specific worries about 5G technology. The second shows how these fears have fuelled specific conspiracies connecting 5G with COVID-19, how they have animated protests and acts of vandalism that have occurred during the pandemic, and the ongoing engagement of conspiracists with official inquiries into 5G. Finally, we argue that a productive way to understand what is happening with 5G is to look beyond conspiracy theories to a larger set of concerns. We argue that the battle for control of 5G infrastructure can be productively understood in geopolitical terms, as forms of economic statecraft, which partly explains why governments are increasingly concerned about countering misinformation and disinformation around 5G.

Cover -- Title Page -- Copyright -- Contents -- Introduction -- Part 1: What Secrecy Means -- 1: Welcome to the World of Top Secrets -- 2: Freedom of Information and Need to Know -- Part 2: UFOs, Aliens, and Cosmic Conspiracies -- 3: The Roswell Files: Abducted! -- 4: You Can't See the Files for the Trees -- 5: UFO Dossiers: Denied and Disappeared -- 6: Inventing an Alien Invasion -- Part 3: Files on Famous Faces -- 7: Marilyn, Moon Dust, and a Missing Diary -- 8: Squidgygate and Secret Tapes -- 9: A Celebrity Sorcerer Goes Spying -- Part 4: Secret Government Projects -- 10: Missing More Often Than Not -- 11: An Ultra-Controversial Project -- 12: Fanning the Flames of Conspiracy -- 13: Experiments on Humans -- 14: A Secret Space Program -- Part 5: Presidents, Politicians, and Powerful People -- 15: Death in Dallas -- 16: Hoover's Secret Files Get Hoovered -- 17: Wiping the Slate Clean -- 18: Seventy Years in the Making -- Conclusion -- Glossary -- For More Information -- For Further Reading -- Bibliography -- Index -- About the Author -- Back Cover

"Non-State Actors in Conflicts: Conspiracies, Myths, and Practices explores some of the most pressing topics in political science and media studies. The contributions gathered here provide alternative perspectives on various non-state actors and their functions in global politics, in addition to providing case studies and theoretical approaches towards non-state actors, such as armed non-state actors and international non-governmental organizations. The volume also covers the topic of conspiracy theories and conspiracies formed in relation to the functions and existence of these actors"--Publisher's description

[Note: This session occurred during the COVID-19 pandemic shortly after the majority of university instruction in the United States had moved online. During the session, individuals joined the online meeting to intentionally cause disruption. This phenomenon, called "Zoombombing" was occurring regularly during online educational sessions at this time. The event hosts addressed the disruption and the session continued. As a result of the disruption, this recording contains language some may find offensive.] In the twelve years the Nazis were in power, the German government convicted around fifty thousand men under the countrys sodomy law, §175 of the penal code. Around ten thousand were sent to concentration camps, where approximately six thousand perished, some subjected to gruesome medical experiments. Today, memory of gay persecution under the Nazis lives on in the form of the pink triangle, a ubiquitous symbol of gay liberation that was originally the designation of homosexual concentration camp inmates. But why did the National Socialist go out of their way to persecute gay men and why did lesbians largely remain untouched by the terror? While the Nazis had run on a moralizing platform that promised to stamp out prostitution and homosexuality, the widespread persecution of homosexuals was motivated not by the eugenic concerns of the Nazis racial state, but rather by fears that gay men were naturally drawn into conspiratorial cliques and thus posed a political threat to the regime. For the same reason, the National Socialists were less apprehensive about the threat of female homosexuality. The fascist government, after all, had succeeded in driving women out of politics and the workplace and back into the home, where they posed less of a threat to society or the state. This talk traces the changing contours of the Nazis divergent treatment of gay men and lesbians, showing when and how their anti-homosexual views arose, how they waxed and waned, and how they ultimately impacted the formation of modern gay and lesbian identity, both in Germany and abroad. ; University Libraries, Virginia Tech